Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 5, 2009

Chasing funding versus chasing customers and a repeatable and scalable business model, is one reason startups fail. Product Development – Getting Funded as The Goal In a traditional product development model, entrepreneurs come up with an idea or concept, write a business plan and try to get funding to bring that idea to fruition.

Customer Development 266

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 266

Steve Blank

SEPTEMBER 10, 2009

In future posts I’ll describe how Eric Ries and the Lean Startup concept provided the equivalent model for product development activities inside the building and neatly integrates customer and agile development. As a result, the standard product development model is not only useless, it is dangerous.

Customer Development 212

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 212

Steve Blank

JUNE 26, 2015

Gore , I’ve found two corporate strategy tools developed by other smart people helpful in bridging Lean Startups with Corporate Innovation. To move innovation faster, we now have 21 st century tools — Business Model Canvas , Customer Development , Agile Engineering – all adding up to a Lean Startup.

Lean 120

Lean Management Business Model Incubator 120

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

I read a ton of existing literature and came up with a formal methodology for search I called Customer Development. Berkeley asked me to teach a class in Customer Development at Haas business school. Eric’s insight was that traditional product management and Waterfall development should be replaced by Agile Development.

Lean 291

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 291

Steve Blank

MARCH 5, 2012

One of the confusing things to entrepreneurs, investors and educators is the relationship between customer development and business model design and business planning and execution. When does a new venture focus on customer development and business models ? And when do business planning and execution come into play?

Search 324

Search Business Model Customer Development Agile 324

Steve Blank

MAY 23, 2016

By the way, the engineering definition of serendipity is, that life is too unpredictable to pre-compute. The Lean LaunchPad class is now taught around the world – and VC’s expect entrepreneurs to talk about not just their technology but their customer development findings. Because none of it will happen as you expect.

Lean 223

Lean Technical Review Vietnam Engineer 223

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 11, 2010

This startup search process is the business model / customer development / agile development solution stack. Business Model Design meets Customer Development. the Lean Launchpad, the first hands-on class utilizing the entire business model/customer development / agile development stack.

Agile 254

Agile Business Model Customer Development Lean 254

Steve Blank

JUNE 18, 2013

I read a ton of existing literature and came up with a formal methodology for search I called Customer Development. Berkeley asked me to teach a class in Customer Development at Haas business school. Eric’s insight was that traditional product management and Waterfall development should be replaced by Agile Development.

Lean 183

Lean Agile Customer Development Business Model 183

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 29, 2009

Like a financial debt, the technical debt incurs interest payments, which come in the form of the extra effort that we have to do in future development because of the quick and dirty design choice. Startups especially can benefit by using technical debt to experiment, invest in process, and increase their product development leverage.

Technical Review 168

Technical Review Software Review San Francisco Lean 168

Startup Lessons Learned

APRIL 14, 2009

Their product definition fluctuates wildly – one month, it’s a dessert topping, the next it’s a floor wax. Their product development team is hard at work on a next-generation product platform, which is designed to offer a new suite of products – but this effort is months behind schedule.

Customer 167

Customer San Francisco Lean Hockey Stick 167

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 1, 2009

I know that this all seems obvious now with the movements started by Steven Blank ( Four Steps of Epiphany ) with the whole Customer Development processes / Lean Startup movements also popularized by people like Eric Ries. I used to always tell my development team, “you need to design a product that my dad could use.

Customer 280

Customer Technical Review Software Review Mexico 280

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 30, 2008

We lack a consistent and clear definition of the job. When Ive asked mentors of mine who have worked in big companies about the role of the CTO, they usually talk about the importance of being the external face of the companys technology platform; an evangelist to developers, customers, and employees. What made them exceptional?

CTO 168

CTO Fractional CTO CTO Hire Technical Review 168

Steve Blank

JANUARY 25, 2010

In this post we’re going to offer a new definition of why startups exist : a startup is an organization formed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. Your job as a founder is to quickly validate whether the model is correct by seeing if customers behave as your model predicts. Winston Churchill. A Business Model.

Agile 335

Agile Startup Silicon Valley Business Model 335

Steve Blank

MARCH 29, 2010

At first we thought of adopting his template for the class, but found that an even more simplified version of a canonical business model that Ann developed worked better. For example, when we taught the value of getting out of the building and agile development, we had Eric Ries talk about the Lean Startup. Teaching Assistants.

Business Model 234

Business Model Silicon Valley California Engineer 234

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 9, 2010

And that narrow definition of entrepreneurship doesn’t count all of the managers inside established companies who are effectively engaged in the same process of building an internal startup (see What is a startup? for my more expansive definition). for my more expansive definition). What motivates all these entrepreneurs?

San Francisco 161

San Francisco Management Founder Lean 161

Startup Lessons Learned

SEPTEMBER 22, 2008

The law of large numbers (of customers) says you cant help but make at least some money - your valuation is determined by how well you monetize the tidal wave of growth. Paid - if your product monetizes customers better than your competitors, you have the opportunity to use your lifetime value advantage to drive growth. Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 167

San Francisco CPA SEM CTO Hire 167

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 20, 2008

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, October 20, 2008 The engineering managers lament I was inspired to write The product managers lament while meeting with a startup struggling to figure out what had gone wrong with their product development process. And this was a huge product, which took years to develop.

Software Review 164

Software Review Engineer Management Technical Review 164

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 17, 2008

Now its time to start to think seriously about how to find a repeatable and scalable sales process, how to position and market the product, and how to build a product development team that can turn an early product into a Whole Product. Usually, that will be about finding new segments of customers that the company can profitably serve.

San Francisco 88

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 88

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 26, 2009

And do your customer development. Thank you @ericries for drastically altering my perception of agile startup Thank you all so much for your kind words. Really enjoyed your speech, but Boulder's startup community is definitely older than 5 years. Provide early seed capital, and be the ones to make those introductions.

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Silicon Valley Startup Lean 113

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 18, 2010

That’s the definition of insanity. Now the company is in crisis mode because the rest of the organization (product development, marketing, etc.) Business Model Design and Customer Development Stack. The alternative to the traditional product introduction process is the Business Model Design and Customer Development Stack.

Burn Rate 250

Burn Rate Management Business Model Customer Development 250

Startup Lessons Learned

JANUARY 18, 2010

Lessons Learned by Eric Ries Monday, January 18, 2010 Case Study: Continuous deployment makes releases non-events The following is a case study of one entrepreneurs transition from a traditional development cycle to continuous deployment. Managing weekly releases got a lot harder once I started doing customer development.

Continuous Deployment 151

Continuous Deployment San Francisco Lean Wiki 151

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 15, 2011

Our Lean LaunchPad class teaches scientists and engineers that starting a company is another research project that can be solved by an iterative process of hypotheses testing and experimentation built around the business model / customer development / agile development solution stack. And I am definitely enjoying it.”.

Silicon Valley 245

Silicon Valley Lean Customer Development Business Model 245

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 15, 2009

If youre looking for resources on getting started, see " Continuous deployment in 5 easy steps ") The goal of continuous deployment is to help development teams drive waste out of their process by simultaneously reducing the batch size and increasing the tempo of their work. How severely is failure punished?

Continuous Deployment 167

Continuous Deployment Software Review San Francisco Lean 167

Steve Blank

MARCH 11, 2015

More agile competitors are starting to eat into our business. I suggested the best place to start the conversation is with the 21 st century definition of a startup: A startup is a temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. for new product development that emphasize immediate returns.

Widget 120

Widget Lean Business Model Metrics 120

Startup Lessons Learned

MAY 14, 2009

The response so far has been nothing short of overwhelming, and I want to especially thank those of you who participated in the survey and customer validation exercise that helped shape this event. I would definitely be interested any scholarship opportunities that might be made available. For now, Id like to ask a favor.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Software Review 60

Steve Blank

APRIL 29, 2013

I was surprised how interested the faculty was in exploring whether the Capstone class could be modified to use the Customer Development process to get input from potential “customers” inside the Air Force. And how the engineering process could be turned Agile. Air Force Customer Development Lean LaunchPad'

Silicon Valley 261

Silicon Valley Colorado Lean Connecticut 261

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 28, 2008

Now there was nothing wrong with their analysis: anyone who invents a technology as sophisticated as The Transformers is definitely going to make a lot of money. Turns out, they were incredibly well-credentialed graduate students who had, in fact, developed some interesting new robotics technology. 2comments: King of the Herd said.

San Francisco 128

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment DC 128

Startup Lessons Learned

JULY 3, 2009

Yet, I think this definition is too important to leave out. davemcclure : amazing concepts on Continuous Development => "Cluster Immune System" @EricRies #LeanStartup @fbFund [link] dalelarson : Because most features take longer to argue and prioritize than to build. Use some customer development to find out.

Lean 60

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Cofounder 60

Startup Lessons Learned

AUGUST 24, 2009

So let’s turn our attention from what may happen in the future to what is definitely happening in the present. All successful media companies had at their heart a series of editors, producers, and agents tasked with discovering and developing new talent. I used to be skeptical of all this talk of “personal brand.&#

San Francisco 113

San Francisco Lean Technical Review Distribution 113

Steve Blank

APRIL 29, 2013

I was surprised how interested the faculty was in exploring whether the Capstone class could be modified to use the Customer Development process to get input from potential “customers” inside the Air Force. And how the engineering process could be turned Agile. Air Force Customer Development Lean LaunchPad Teaching'

Silicon Valley 154

Silicon Valley Colorado Lean Connecticut 154

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 5, 2009

Unfortunately, most decisions that confront startups lack a definitive right answer. The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Customer Development ► June (3) What is a startup? By reducing the decisions we have to make to a series of quantitative questions, we can avoid a lot of real-life messiness. Expo SF (May.

San Francisco 102

San Francisco Lean Continuous Deployment Startup 102

Steve Blank

NOVEMBER 2, 2009

For those of you who have been following the discussion, a Lean Startup is Eric Ries ’s description of the intersection of Customer Development , Agile Development and if available, open platforms and open source. The Customer Development process (and the Lean Startup) is one way to do that.

Lean 257

Lean Silicon Valley Startup RSS 257

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 21, 2010

So let’s begin with a definition of a startup that captures its essential nature, and tries to leave behind the specific associations of the most famous startups. Isn’t the word human redundant in this definition? And yet the newness of a startup’s product or service is also a key part of the definition.

San Francisco 168

San Francisco Startup Lean Continuous Deployment 168

andrewchenblog.com

MARCH 10, 2010

Coupled with A/B testing, customer development, and thinking through business problems in a scientific, hypothesis-driven way, you end up with a powerful cocktail of techniques to build a modern startup in the most iterative way possible. Eric Ries has a great article advocating for why it’s OK to Embrace Technical Debt.

Technical Review 47

Technical Review Design Las Vegas Product 47

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 19, 2009

Unfortunately, after months or even years of development, many companies discover that customers arent willing to buy their new wares. Thats why some entrepreneurs are trying another approach to product launches: marketing a product online before spending much on research and development or inventory. Read the rest.

San Francisco 137

San Francisco Product Lean Continuous Deployment 137

Startup Lessons Learned

OCTOBER 21, 2008

Everything else (including a lot of traditional "agile" or "lean" tactics) is waste. Basically, the definition of waste is different when you know less about your customer. Toyota employs something called "set-based product development" where they develop multiple versions of a product at once. It isnt the goal.

Lean 121

Lean San Francisco Continuous Deployment Startup 121

YoungUpstarts

JANUARY 17, 2016

It is not surprising if you are feeling overwhelmed by this; you are definitely not alone. We are in the midst of great change and many businesses of all shapes and sizes are figuring out how they can implement the right social customer service strategy to meet the ever changing expectations of this increasingly powerful generation.

Customer 100

Customer Singapore Advisory Board Asia 100